Data transfer and accessibility tend to be important aspects for any computer system. As network connectivity expands, data access needs may span great physical distances and may traverse increasingly complex communications architecture and channels. Moreover, everyday Internet users have many options to access and share information (e.g., peer-to-peer technology, broadcast or webcast transmissions, and remotely accessing protected networks, among others). As the Internet increases in popularity, however, demands for managing and securing information grow rapidly (e.g., to prevent unauthorized access to a network).
Among other techniques, a network may often incorporate a firewall to exclude unauthorized users and/or traffic from accessing information behind the firewall. For example, a network may be designed to place various addressable locations and/or systems behind or within the protections of the firewall (e.g., the firewall may monitor information passing into or out of a network, applying various security policies to allow or exclude certain traffic). Further, organizations may often employ measures to partition access privileges across various portions of a network (e.g., restricting access to financial records to authorized financial officers). As such, firewalls may protect important information not only against remote threats, but also to implement internal or local security measures.
Even when automated systems constantly monitor a network for certain conditions and/or activities (e.g., unauthorized access attempts), other problems concerning accessibility of the protected network may arise. For example, with many organizations having globally distributed networks, or engaging in joint ventures with other entities, or users desiring expansive and far-reaching connectivity, network architectures should be flexible enough to allow distributed computing to occur, while still protecting information against unauthorized access, data corruption, or other potential security breaches. As such, simply placing a firewall within a network will not necessarily solve all access-related concerns faced by an administrator for a given network. In fact, protecting a network via a firewall may create other issues relating to network management, such as proscribing access to an area or location within a network for authorized remote users.
One technique often used to provide access to a private network for remote users includes establishing a virtual private network (VPN). Most VPNs employ a gateway to provide remote access (e.g., a machine having an interface to both a private network and a public network). For example, a user may log on to the private network by accessing the gateway via the public network interface. Other existing techniques, including circuit-level security technology (e.g., SOCKs or other proxies), also require a gateway. However, gateway configurations typically must be set up by trained professionals and must be maintained by ongoing quality control and service personnel. Furthermore, a common application interface may be need to deploy a VPN solution or other existing gateway solution. As such, to employ a VPN, organizational maintenance costs may increase significantly, as the organization would have to maintain the network, proxy servers, the gateway, and supporting applications, among other things.
Existing systems suffer from these and other problems.